I’m going to re-release my two relationship books as one book and do some updating to the text (I am older and wiser–think Yoda!). 😉

I had insomnia the other night, like always, and threw together some VERY low fidelity ideas. The fonts aren’t great, the photos aren’t perfect, these are the most BASIC of mock-ups. But I wanted to see what you guys liked the most so I could focus my attention on which one people were most drawn to.

I don’t want to waste time working on all of them for hours, then do this, if there are certain ones that no one likes.

Now, the good part of a poll is that it’s anonymous, so you can be totally honest and I won’t know who you are and even if I did, I promise I wouldn’t yell. I need honesty, so one of the options will be that you don’t like any of them.

Any help or suggestions (comments) would also be very appreciated! Like, “Move the text there” or “Change the color” or “Like the pic, hate the font” etc…

Thank you!

Now, here for a barrage of pictures, then the poll will be at the bottom of the page. You can pick up to 4 of them as your favorites. 🙂 XOXOXO

I know this title seems similar to my last video, Truth 2: Be Brave, but there really is a difference.

I think of bravery is doing something in the moment that is necessary.

I think of courage as the building of character that gives a person the wherewithal to do what’s right or needed not only now, but for the long haul.

My darling friend Jill exemplifies both, and this video is dedicated to her and her amazing courage in telling breast cancer to go fuck itself. You’ll love her after you hear about her. I know I love her.

Now, for some reason, I saved the video at a lower resolution so it would load faster, and now it has a huge black frame around it. NO CLUE. And I’m good with technology, but I’m baffled with this. Also, what a hideous freezy-face! Really?? THAT face??

UPDATE!

I am so tickled to share with you a couple of Dodi Ball hair styles. One from my sissy and one from a girlfriend of mine. Don’t they look lovely? 🙂

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Last week I was at the doctor’s, waiting in the lobby and twiddling my thumbs, when this lovely lady approached me and told me that I have gorgeous hair.

After blushing and telling her that she’d made my day, she sat down and asked me what I do to have such shiny, edible-smelling hair. After I told her my process, she told me she was going to go follow my routine to see if she could get her limp, kinda-fried hair to look like a Pantene commercial.

I also shared one of my tricks of the trade, The Dodi Ball, with my sister a few weeks ago, and after she tried it she took a pic of her hair in the morning and sent it to me. She was so excited about how her hair looked…it made a sissy proud!

So, I thought I might share this with you guys too.

Now, I am not saying by ANY stretch of the imagination that my hair is the hair dreams are made of. That lead chick on the TV show Quantico has the PERFECT hair and I would happily kill her for it.

But, I do have a few tricks up my sleeve I can give you that might help. This will be especially helpful for people with hair long enough to put in a ponytail.

WARNING: This is a looooong post. And when you first glance at it you may think, there is NO WAY IN BLOODY HELL I’m doing all of this. But you do most of it anyway–everyone washes their hair, right? And, you only have to do it about once a week. The whole process, including the shower, only takes about 30 minutes and it’s well worth it when you see how healthy your hair can look.

Step 1: Shampoo only your roots.

I used to do hair shows back 100 years ago for Paul Mitchell, Toni & Guy, etc…and while I never appreciated the outrageous cuts and colors I’d leave with, I did learn one valuable thing: QUIT WASHING THE BOTTOM HALF OF YOUR HAIR!!

Here’s why. Cause I told you so. KIDDING!!! 😉 (Had to include some sass!)

Unless you are out rolling around in the mud, chances are the hair below your ears isn’t truly dirty…maybe just a little dusty. When you wash your hair, it strips the natural oils out of it and for people with long hair, you want as much of that oil as you can get in the hair below your ears.

So, when you wash your hair, just wash the hair all around your scalp and when you rinse it the shampoo will run down over the bottom half of your hair and get it as clean as it needs to be. No direct shampoo application to the hair below your ears is necessary.

This is the shampoo I use. It’s a little pricey, but I’m going to tell you later how to mitigate that with sheer laziness! 🙂

I also occasionally alternate my shampoos and use these. They are more affordable as long as you buy them in the large (usually quart-sized containers). The eSalon only sells in a 8oz (which is pure suck!).

Step 2: Condition only below the ears

Conditioner is a wonderful and delicious thing and I use it obsessively. But it never needs to go anywhere near your roots. Conditioner will weigh your hair down and make it lay flatter on your head.

Now, if you want flat head, you go on with your bad self. But if you’d like a little volume, no conditioner from the ears up.

And, leave it in your hair for AT LEAST 5 minutes in the shower. I put it on my hair and then wash everything, shave everything and shake my ass while singing “Baby Got Back.” That way I’m multi-tasking in the shower and my hair gets to reap the rewards!

I also switch up my conditioners occasionally, or put on a 2nd one in the shower if I have the time or inclination. Here are the matching conditioners:

Step 3: Grease it up!

While still in the shower, but after finishing everything else, I use the below oil on my hair. Where do I use it? I hope you said out loud, “Only below my ears!” Mama is proud if you knew the answer!

The reason I use it while still in the shower is that I HATE the feeling of nasty, sticky oil on my hands. Ewwww ick! So, I put in on my hair after I’ve squeezed out all the extra water, then I wash my hands while in the shower. I use 6 pumps of this oil, but I have pretty long hair, so start with less then work your way up if your hair is thin or shorter than mine.

You can also use a quality Moroccan Oil. That stuff can be fabulous.

Step 4: (Hell yes, there are more steps!) Leave-in conditioner

I’ve used a bunch of leave-in conditioners over the years and my two favorites are:

I put these on after a good towel dry, and then massage them gently (that sounds dirty!) into my hair.

Where do I put this conditioner??? Where oh where you might ask? BELOW MY EARS! 😉

Again, conditioner will weigh down your hair, so you don’t want to put it near your noggin.

When I use the It’s a 10 plus Keratin, I put about 8 sprays on each side of my hair.

When I use the Perfect Ending (which I KNOW they named it that cause it reminds you of a Happy Ending!) I use a glob about the size of a tall dime.

Both of these will help protect your hair and keep it healthier.

Step 5: Just say NO to the greasies!

I have a trick that I use to keep the greasies away: Paul Mitchell Freeze & Shine hairspray.

I’ve been using this product for literally over 30 years. It’s the bee’s knees! And it NEVER flakes like a lot of other hairsprays. ‘Cause yeah, that’s what we all want. Hair that is shiny but looks like you have giant lice or heavy dandruff because the stupid hairspray flaked when you brushed your hair the next day.

People should NOT be allowed to sell hairspray if it flakes. I wanna smack ’em! 😉

I spray it all around my roots and a little heavier at my part. I’ll tell you soon why this step is SO important.

Step 6: Go au natural

I try to NEVER dry my hair with a dryer. Why not just put your hair in a frying pan and dry it that way?

Plus, I’m lazy as fuck, so I hate standing there drying it. Boring! If someone else does it for me…well, that’s another story…

Now, is my hair perfect looking when it drys naturally? Heck no. Drying it with a dryer, while brushing it the whole time, smooths the cuticle, so your hair has the APPEARANCE of being healthier. But you are still oven baking it, so if you can avoid the blow dryer, that’s a good thing. Your hair will love you.

Here’s my hair dried naturally. You can see it’s a wee bit bonkers! I was in Vegas, hung over, and I sure as shit was not worried about my hair. 😉

Step 7: Don’t go au natural!

I am full of contradictions! 🙂

Since I’ve spared my hair the evils of the blow dryer, now I’m going to put in on a spit and roast it over some flames to get that dang cuticle smoooth.

But, I have a little helper I use to keep my hair from frying while using the dreaded curling or flat iron!

That image is for shit, so here’s the name of it: Ion Heat Protecting Smoothing Spray.

I curl my hair in 6 sections; 3 curls on each side. I spray 2 sprays of this on each section of my hair, then put a quick curl into it. Where do I spray it? Below the ears! 😉

This smooths the cuticle, adds a ridiculous amount of shine and makes me look like I just walked out of a salon.

I use this curling iron:

I like this one for a few reasons:

I’ve dropped it 5,000+ times and it’s never broken.

I’ve had it for 10+ years and it works like it did the day I bought it.

It has a dial on it that lets you pick how hot you want it.

That dial is what can help you smooth your cuticle without setting your hair on fire. Put it down to 20 or so and it’s still hot enough to do what you want, but won’t turn your hair into a crispy critter.

If you want a tight curl, you’ll probably need to have it set closer to its maximum of 30. But if you are just looking to smooth your hair, a lower setting is fine.

Also, I only curl my hair one time between washes. I just do it to smooth the cuticle and once it’s smooth, it’s smooth.

Step 8: The Dodi Ball (I should trademark this shit!)

The Dodi Ball is the best trick of all.

If you want hair that has volume and wave, this is a must.

Plus, if you get hot while you sleep or have hot flashes like my old ass, it’s lovely to have the Dodi Ball in place while you sleep. And if you have long hair, it’ll keep you from getting tangled in it all night.

This is my hair after having the Dodi Ball in all night long:

I, literally, didn’t even brush my hair in the morning.

I took it out of the Dodi Ball and it fell into place like this. HEAVEN because I’ll do just about anything to get 5 more minutes of sleep in the morning. If I can cut “fix fucking hair” out of my agenda, then I’m one happy girl.

So, what is the Dodi Ball and how do you do it?

Before you go to bed, comb your hair with a wide-tooth comb. This is the one I use:

I bet I don’t touch my hair with a brush but once a week, if that. The wide tooth comb will split your ends less and it’s gentler on your hair than most brushes.

After combing out any tangles, flip over at the waist so that your hair is reaching for the floor.

Wrap your hands around it right up at your head like you are going to put it into a pony tail at the very top of your noggin.

Then twist your hair all the way to the ends. Once you’ve twisted it, keep hold of it and then stand up.

When you look in the mirror, you’ll be holding a length of twisted hair that’s essentially coming out of the crown of your head.

Then keep twisting it and make a bun out of it on top of your hair. Then use a loose scrunchie (how the hell do you spell that??) and wrap the scrunchie around the base of your bun until it stays in place.

The key here is that you don’t want a tight scrunchie because it’ll leave a dent in your hair where the elastic cuts into it. You want a scrunchie that’s tight enough to stay in place, but loose enough to not dent.

I get mine at Walmart, the cheaper the better. I go through every multi-pack of scrunchies they have to find the ones with the loosest elastic and buy those.

If you do get a dent, you can always smooth it with a curling or flat iron, but as my ultimate goal is to wash my hair as infrequently as possible and spend no more than 10 seconds a day on it, I try to avoid the Dodi Ball Hair Dent.

Then, in the morning, take out your Dodi Ball, run your fingers through hair and voila, beautiful, wavy hair that has laid against the grain all night so you will also have way more volume at the root than you would otherwise have.

Throw in a few spritzes of the Paul Mitchell Freeze & Shine and you are ready to go!

Step 9: Quit washing your damn hair so much!

Now, I know this might gross you out, but I only wash my hair every 5 days or so. Sometimes 6. Occasionally 7. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE GAWDS, WOMAN? You are gross!

Nope, not gross. Well, not all the time. I do bathe every day. I just don’t get my hair wet.

Back in the 50s (from what my mom tells me) most women washed their hair once a week. They had those beehive hairdos and used lots of Aqua Net. The didn’t walk around with stinky, dirty heads and neither do I, nor will you.

Unless you have naturally greasy hair that looks like you could fry an egg on it after one day without a shampoo, you really don’t have to wash your hair so much.

Remember how Step 5 was all about the hairspray at your roots? This is why!

I do this while my hair is still wet. Having the hairspray up by your roots will keep the oil monster from invading your hair for a few extra days. Less oil monster, less washing, more time to sleep, eat, git sum nookie, etc…

Step 10: It’s stripper time!

In reality, your hair should be smelling pretty damn good at this point. Plus, Paul Mitchell Freeze & Shine smells like Jolly Rancher watermelon candy, so people will want to eat you as-is.

But if you want to have people following you around in stores and dreaming of your hair, put a spray of this onto your lovely locks.

It’s Pink Sugar Hair Perfume (a lovely companion to the Pink Sugar Perfume I wrote about a few years ago) and it’ll make you want to eat your own hair.

It smells like delicious baked goods and sexy strippers. How can you go wrong?

If you want to get any of this stuff, or any other products, here are a few recommendations to get them on the cheap. You can click on the underlined links to get there fast.

I use this site before I shop online for, quite literally, anything. RetailMeNot. You enter in the name of the store you want to shop at and it’ll give you coupon codes you can use.

Ulta carries some of the products I have listed above. If you go to RetailMeNot, they typically have a coupon for $3.50 off a $10.00 purchase. That’s where I get the Joico and Pureology hair care and the Paul Mitchell hairspray.

If you are planning on trying any of the eSalon products, you can click on this link to get a $10.00 discount. eSalon. (I’m pretty sure the promo still works.) Also, I use their hair dye and it is FABULOUS! 🙂

The comb I get from WalMart, though it’s in-store only. I think I got a 2-pack for $3.00 or something like that. Super cheap and awesome.

The Ion Heat Protecting Smoothing Spray comes solely from Sally Beauty Supply and is around $9.00.

And, last but not least, to have a sultry, stripper-esque scent, you gotta get your mitts on the Pink Sugar Hair Perfume. I’d suggest doing a Google search to find the cheapest price.

Whew! That was a lot of info! 🙂 I hope it helps anyone that has medium or long hair but doesn’t want to spend any time babying it. I know I sure don’t!

If all of this works for you, email me a pic! I’d love to see the results.

I’m telling you, life is NEVER dull. 😉 Not that I wish to be bored, but c’mon, a little peace now and again is a good thing.

So, 3 weeks ago I got my hair dyed.

It’s pretty much been every color in the rainbow over the last 30 years.

My very first “boyfriend” told me one day that, “You’d be perfect if only you were blonde.” Of course what did I do? I immediately went and dyed it blonde and just as immediately realized that blonde is NOT a good look on me. Eeeee gawds, it was a nightmare. Especially with my personality.

If some guy said that to me today I’d verbally cut him until he crawled home crying for his mommy, dragging his entrails behind him. But I was 14 then and always concerned with being as perfect as possible. Thank God I don’t worry about that shit anymore. Take me as I am or fuck off. I rather like that mantra! 😉

I went to get the blonde nightmare fixed a few days later and ended up with 3 different colors of hair. I don’t know why the fix-it hair dyeing adventure turned into such a fiasco, but the good news was that my mom understood that I couldn’t go into public and she let me skip school for a week until I could wash a bunch of it out of my hair. Best Mom Ever Award for that! 🙂

Over the years it’s been light brown with highlights, black, dark brown, that purpley-red color, accidentally green (yep, that sucked as much as you’d think), red, and so on. I get bored easily with my hair color. Now, the style’s been the same for 20 years and will probably be the same until I die. But the color? That I like to mess with.

So, when I got my hair dyed a few weeks ago I went with a blue black. I wanted that shit dark dark dark. My chick used the same brand of dye she always does and everything seemed okay.

Then a few days later I noticed this weird thing on my forehead right by my hairline. It looked like a skin-colored scrape about 1/3 of an inch in diameter. As I was looking at it thinking, “Please God–no skin cancer. I know I tanned my ridiculously white skin a lot when growing up, but I haven’t had a tan in 20 years. Please spare me skin cancer…” I noticed all these black dots on my scalp. What the fuck? Hmmm…they didn’t look like the typical dye blotches that appear on my scalp after a hair color. These were tiny little specks like someone took a Sharpie and put dots on my noggin.

Well, whatever. I’ll just scrub my head harder next time I wash it to get the dye off.

Uhhh…the dots didn’t come off after the next shampoo. Or the next 5 shampoos.

Finally, after 3 weeks I’m like, “What in the ever-loving shit is on my fuckin’ head?” As we know, I’ve been dyeing my hair for 30 years. I’d never seen anything like it. So I had to investigate.

Can I just tell you…NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER Google something like “black spots on scalp.” NEVER! It’s horrifying.

I went from “Hmmm…that looks odd” to “HOLY FUCKING HELL WHAT THE FUCK OH MY GOD I’M DYING THIS IS AWFUL HOW DID THIS HAPPEN WHY ME SOMEONE KILL ME THIS FUCKING SUCKS.” Yep…all one sentence.

When you Google “black spots on scalp” you learn that you’d be better off dead than with the host of things that come up as possible diseases or conditions.

Keep in mind that I typically stick to sites like WebMD or Mayo Clinic for medical advice as I feel they are likely a bit more accurate than, ‘Jodi’s dumb ass blog on weird stuff,” but even those scared the shit out of me.

Some of the suggestions were: Mold (WHAT THE FUCK???). Fungus (I WANT TO DIE). Ringworm (This is when the panic set in).

All of the sites also mentioned itching. My head didn’t itch before I read that. Now it was as if spiders were crawling around on my head. I know, totally psychosomatic, and I kept trying to rationalize it, but I was scared shitless, so a bit of irrational was starting to slip through.

Then Grant gets home and I tell him what’s going on. He grabs a flashlight and tells me I have black dots ALL OVER MY HEAD!!! I thought it was just that one small spot, but nope. They are EVERYFUCKINGWHERE! Oh, the horror!

So, I immediately got on the phone to schedule an appointment with a dermatologist. If I fucking have any of those things I wanted it diagnosed immediately and then I wanted someone to decapitate me.

Of course, out of the 6 I called, 3 didn’t answer the phone (I’m thinking their businesses are covers for drug running, otherwise how do they stay in business?), 2 sent me to voicemail (how can they close on a Tuesday before 4 pm? Must be nice…) and the last one kept me on hold for, and I kid you not, 15 minutes. 4 times people picked up the line and I’d repeat, “Hi, I’m calling to make an appointment as a new patient,” and they’d always say, “Just a minute,” and I’d wait 5 more. I wanted to smash something violently. First off, what shitty customer service. Secondly, I’VE GOT MOTHERFUCKING FUNGUS, MOLD OR WORMS ON MY MOTHERFUCKING HEAD. SOMEONE NEEDS TO HELP ME BEFORE I PASS OUT FROM HORROR!!!

And of course in the meanwhile I’m terrified to touch my head, lean it onto a pillow, let my husband anywhere near me. I made him throw away his brush cause I’d used it earlier in the day. He tried to hug me and I yelped, “NO! You’ll get the Mange!”

Finally, the idiots at the dermatologist’s office get back on the phone and they can’t see me for a week.

So, I make the appointment anyway and then rush out of the house to go to Urgent Care. By now it’s after 5pm and no doctor in the state is open except Urgent Care. And I was sincerely starting to have a panic attack at the idea of a foreign body making its home in my head. God bless Valium.

When I get to the first one, I open the door to what I can only assume was an outbreak of The Plague. So I said, “Uh, fuck this,” and left and went to another one where everyone looked like they were suffering from Ebola. Damn flu season. So, fuck that one too. I just went home and wouldn’t let anyone or anything near me until I could get in to see someone in the morning.

Finally, morning comes ’round (after a lovely night chocked full of wormy, fungus-filled dreams) and I get an appointment to see a doc.

I go there at 10:30 and they are so nice and lovely. The doc comes in and I explain what’s going on.

She looks at my head and says, “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Great. I’m a medical mystery full of fungus and mold and worms and God knows what.

Then she plays a bit with my noggin and determines that the dye (which is some stubborn-ass dye) had grabbed hold of all the new baby hairs growing out of my scalp and gotten kind of stuck at the follicle (if you’ll recall I mentioned earlier in the year that I had a bunch of hair loss due to thyroid and iron/protein deficiencies). The hair was just a tiny bit of a millimeter long and hardly even out of my scalp yet, so the dye clung to those tiny pieces of hair and went down a bit into the skin. This was why it wasn’t easily washing off in the shower.

Can I tell you that I have rarely been more relieved in my entire life? EVER! I wanted to hump her in thanks for her awesome diagnosis.

She said she could see why I’d have been terrified, but that I’m good to go and that she wished all her appointments ended on such a happy note.

Whew!!!!

What an absolute cluster-fuck. I had told Grant that I just could not take one more medical issue and was going to snap from the stress. Luckily, I have a wonderful hubby who was supportive even when we did think I had The Funk. Thank God it was just some weird dyeing anomaly and I am worm-mold-fungus free! Yay!!!!

So, that’s my saga. I’m just happy that my noggin is good to go. I’m quite certain I couldn’t have handled any other outcome because they were just too damn gross!

You guys KICK ASS!!

Kinda FREE books! Woo Hoo!

Because I love you guys, get my relationship books for only $.99 on Kindle, the cookbook for $1.99 (Amazon forced me to up the price--jerks!) or any of them for FREE for Kindle Prime members. Go git 'em! :)

If you don't have a Kindle, it's okay. Download the Kindle Reader to any device, phone or computer. That way you can still get all 3 books on the cheap.

A Get-More-Nookie Book? Wha??

Horribly sarcastic, naughty and full of curse words. NO ONE should read this, unless you like that stuff. ;)

Want the Man of Your Dreams? Anyone?

Maybe slightly less mouthy, but still full of piss and vinegar (and tons of heart too)

Oh Yeah, it’s Cookbook Time!

Click My Goofy Mug, Darnit!

Awesome Proofer and Editor!

Click her fine-looking mug to check out my fabulous editor!

Click to Get Yours! 2 Lovely Purses in 1.

Kick Ass Awards Given to Me!

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